With Thanksgiving mere hours away, the nation has once again turned its very short attention span to the profound and essential task of pardoning a turkey. The tradition goes back decades. But it is stupid, a waste of time and resources, and it should be ditched altogether.
For decades, (some say going back to President Harry Truman, others say as far back as President Abraham Lincoln) two healthy and robust turkeys are presented to the president. For whatever cruel and bizarre reason, they are named something clever, usually, and one of them is pardoned while the other is supposedly cooked for Thanksgiving dinner. The idea is just silly and trivial, as intended. For many presidents, the act has probably provided a bit of much-needed frivolity during times of crisis, seriousness, and even war.
Recommended Stories
Thanksgiving as a holiday is as necessary as apple pie and baseball. President George Washington was supposedly the first to say Nov. 26 should be a day of “public thanksgiving.” Lincoln stepped up to mark the official holiday to be held on the last Thursday of November.
Over the centuries, turkey became the acceptable dish de jure just for that holiday. One can only wonder why: The meat itself is often bland (no matter how expertly it is cooked), takes forever to cook, and requires a million fatty calorie-laden side dishes in order to feel like the entire feast is satisfactory. Still, Americans (who created Apple, Google, and the greatest voting system in the history of the world), still allow themselves to gorge on this subpar meat. To add insult to injury, and I’m sure to the point of being a laughingstock of other countries, Americans then pretend to be interested in the fate of these turkeys and whether or not they will be cooked on Thanksgiving Day.
The news industry, often accustomed to reporting on matters of importance like the national debt, the unemployment rate, a housing crisis, national security, or all of the above, will often report breathlessly about what happens to the pardoned turkey. For many years, the turkeys President Barack Obama pardoned were sent to Disneyland (of course) to retire in the happiest place on earth — after they served as the honorary grand marshals of Disney’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
The turkeys President Obama pardoned in 2016, Tater and Tot, “went to live out their years in a place called Gobbler’s Rest, an area of Virginia Tech’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, where the birds are cared for by students and veterinarians in the Department of Animal and Poultry Sciences.”
But why? What really is the use of pardoning turkeys, meat that is bland and inferior, but still meat that is expected to consume on Thanksgiving Day? Many, many presidents have committed their Thanksgiving Days to service. In 2003, President George W. Bush surprised troops in Iraq on Thanksgiving Day. Obama often helped serve meals in various food pantries around Washington, D.C. on Thanksgiving Day.
If we are a country of generosity and we are going to engage in the absolutely absurd spectacle of pardoning a turkey as if it is some sort of big deal, why not do something useful with the pardoned turkey? Why not make a statement and proclaim: “The turkey does not deserve to be pardoned because it was raised to be food.” All of the turkeys, whatever their clever names, should then be cooked and served to the nearest homeless shelters. The number of people who are homeless in Washington is larger than it was five years ago. This way, people who have needs far greater than ours can at least be satiated for the day with a familiar holiday meal.
Otherwise, if the turkeys are not going to be put to good use — and by that, I mean they are going to wave at us from a parade — let’s ban the trivial waste of time and resources that pardoning a turkey represents. In America, land of bounty and resources, let’s use all things wisely — whether that be actual meat from a bland animal or the time of the president and the media alike.
Nicole Russell (@russell_nm) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. She is a journalist who previously worked in Republican politics in Minnesota.
